The Cambria freeman. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1867-1938, 1887-04-01
GREEN TEA AND BLACK TEA.
Process By which Leaves Are Prepared
for Market.

The principal market for green tea Is
the United States. Having fallen rather
into disrepute in the Old World. il has
established itself in the New World.
whore it is largely consumed and known
as tea simply, in cOntradistinction
to " English breakfast tea " China
tea, or Oolong," by which names the
black teas are designated.
The reason for its popularity Is no
doubt in a great measure due to the
Intercourse with Japan. where green
tea alone is manufac= -ad. and which
every year sends y-.lsmous cargoes
across the Pacific.
In the making OF tea, as In everything
which this curious people do the
japanese have a way OF their own. It
would startle an Assam planter to see
them in picking time squatting down
before the trees and stripping the
branches of the leaves, instead OF scien-
titically selecting only the young, un-
developed leaf, the first leaf below that,
and half the second, from which would
be evolved respectively, Broken Tips,
or Orange Pekoe," "Pekoe," and
"SouchOng"
Any one accustomed TO the elaborate
machines for rolling and firing" leaves
which are in use on European planta-
tions might be amused at the Japanese
method, where the workers roll and
squeeze and twist the leaves Ia their
hands on a parchment stretched over a
charcoal fire.
Very fine teas are, nevertheless, manu-
featured by the japanese, and in the
celebrated district Of Uji rumor tells of
tea worth SIC per pound, though II is
not definitely stated whether that price
has ever actually been paid for it.
Moreover in the case of teas in
tended for export only so much work
Is done upon them as will enable them to
be sent TO the "tea-flring godowns" Of
Yokohama, where they are worked up for
the market before shipped.
As is now well known, the difference
between green tea and black lies in
the fact that IN the former fermenta-
ton has been arrested by firing" the
color of the leaf being in this way
partially preserved and fixed; with the
latter, by a much longer process, fer
mentatiOn up to a certain point Is
permitted, and the leaves are not
fired until they have become oxi-
died by exposure to the air.
In Japan the leaves, after being
picked and ''whitered' by a short eX-
pOSure, are fired in the way described
above sufficiently to stop fermentation,
and In this partially cured state are
sent to tho European tea merchants, by
whom they are again fired"
In the 'godOwns" of Yokohama hun
dreds of women can be seen at work
turning the leaves over and over and
round and round In large basins built
over charcoal fire. The cOlOTing or
painting" is also done at this period
hy means Of a spoonful of indigo
and powdered soapstone put into
each basin, and thus disseminated
through its contents.
But in Japan tea is not grown for
export only, but is the chief article OF
home consumption; and these domestic
teas as procured in the country are
probably the only samples of unadul-
tcrated green tea which Europeans are
likely to meet with.
They produce a beverage which IS re
freshing, quite harmless, and which,
notwithstanding the way in which it Is
prepared, can, after only a short resi-
dence in the country, be readily dis
tinguished from hot water.-[Pau Mall
Gazette